Daddy-Long-Legs is Mary Pickford as a bright orphan who writes her way to independence, in a film that is funny, touching and full of her best qualities.
Daddy-Long-Legs (1919), directed by Marshall Neilan and based on Jean Webster’s novel, stars Pickford as Jerusha Abbott, an orphan raised in an asylum who is sent to college by a mysterious benefactor she knows only as Daddy-Long-Legs. She writes him letters about her new life, her studies and her growing independence.
Pickford’s Jerusha is lively, curious and determined not to be pitied. She treats college as an adventure and a chance, and Pickford plays her education, both academic and emotional, with a lightness that makes the film’s romance and its ending feel earned.
It is a signature role because it gathers Pickford’s strengths: the orphan heroine, the comedy of a young woman out of her depth, and the serious point that education and work can change a life.